True World Group to focus on Europe for growth

True World Group, a major supplier of seafood to Japanese-themed restaurants, will further tout sustainability as its calling card and will focus on Europe for growth, the company’s president, Woo Soon Shin, told SeafoodSource in an interview at the 2017 Seafood Expo Global.

Shin said the company, which specializes in supplying products to sushi restaurants, has doubled in size in the past five years. Shin said moving forward, he would change the company’s focus from the United States to Europe, where he sees the best future opportunity for growth.

“We’re seeing our best numbers in Europe, with 4x growth in the United Kingdom in the last five years,” he said. “The U.S.A. is already built up, so we will try to expand in Europe, with specific plans to expand further in the U.K. and in Spain as well.” 

Managing Director Bongjin Jung said True World Group’s chief strength was its trustworthiness in the eyes of buyers in sourcing and delivering fresh and sustainable seafood.

“We know our customers feel we are reliable in choice, sustainability and safety,” he said. 

At the expo, the company touted its sustainability bona fides by sponsoring a tuna-cutting demonstration, donating a farmed bluefin tuna it claimed was “100 percent sustainable.” The company said it recently figured out a technique to raise tuna “from the egg,” though it acknowledges its fish-in, fish-out ratio for the process is still around 22:1, with the tuna requiring around 2.5 years to reach a harvestable size.

“Tuna has big issues around sustainability, and we’re trying to find a sustainable way to approach the species,” Jung said. “We want to find a better way of doing it, and we’re willing to invest our resources to do so.”